Internet Protocol (IP) multicast is a bandwidth conserving technology that reduces traffic by simultaneously delivering a single stream of information to thousands of corporate recipients and homes. Applications where Internet Protocol (IP) multicast can be of significant advantage include videoconferencing, corporate communications, distance learning, and distribution of software, stock quotes, and news.
It should be appreciated that IP multicast can deliver source traffic to multiple receivers without adding any additional burden on the source or the receivers and while using the least network bandwidth of any competing technology. As a part of this approach, multicast packets can be replicated in the network by a router that is enabled with supporting protocols that support the delivery of data to multiple receivers.
Global multicast addresses are allocated by the Internet authority while local multicast addresses are allocated by the system administrator of a particular domain. Packets forwarded to particular multicast group are intended to be sent to the multicast group address range that is associated with the packets.
However, in many situations it is desirable that content originated within a first multicast group address domain be carried to other multicast group address domains that are either locally scoped or that are accessible through the global Internet. In either case, a translation of addresses from a first multicast group address range to a second multicast group address range may need to be performed. It should be appreciated that this can involve translating one multicast group address range into another multicast group address range or even into a unicast address range. Current approaches do not provide effective means by which one multicast address range can be translated into another multicast address range or into a unicast address range.
The drawings referred to in this description should not be understood as being drawn to scale except if specifically noted.